ARE THE LOBBYISTS FOR LARGE WEALTHY TAXPAYERS SUCCEEDING?

Influencing Congress to curtail IRS abuse seems to have caught on and is supported by many….until we think about it.  On April 4, 2016, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities recently reported in an article IRS Funding Cuts Compromise Taxpayer Service and Weaken Enforcement that the IRS budge has been cut 17% since 2010 weakening the IRS ability to enforce the tax laws.  In fact with over 13,000 less employee (12,000 enforcement staff) it has resulted in the lowest audit levels in a decade.  These budget cuts are in addition to the IRS increased responsibilities including 9 million more individual returns filed, enforcement of ACA, FACTA, and its focus on identity theft that alone results in $6 billion of fraudulent refunds being issued by the IRS every year.

House Republicans have targeted the IRS for sharp cuts since the Lois Lerner fiasco.  Senator Ted Cruz pledges to keep his promises as he runs for President and then naively promises that he will eliminate the IRS.  We as taxpayers know that there is a cost to living in a civilize society.  However, what is happening is that the large influential taxpayers with their millions to spend to defend their underreporting and underpayment of tax are now just too big for the IRS to successfully audit with its limited budgets and lack of resources.  The IRS has now been reduced to do what it does best, and that is simply going after the little guy (middle and lower class).

One has to wonder if the reduction of enforcement of the tax laws as to the wealthy taxpayers and large multinational corporations is just an unforeseen consequence of cutting the IRS budget or is it the result of an overall plan by the wealthy influential taxpayer and the Republicans. 

In 2010, the IRS was given the most powerful tool for enforcement of the tax laws, IRC §7623(b)…a strengthened Whistleblower program.  The IRS was mandated to pay 15% -30% of the tax collected based upon information that was provided to it from an individual that resulted in the determination of tax.  However, this was with respect to only large taxpayers in which there was more than $2,000,000 of tax in dispute.  Thousands of whistleblower claims have been handed to the IRS on a silver platter every year involving large wealthy taxpayers, but for unknown reasons, the IRS has not used the whistleblower program as it should by working with whistleblowers, expediting these whistleblower cases through the system, and promoting the whistleblower program.  Perhaps with the current limited budget, the IRS will realize that is more important now than ever before to embrace the whistleblower program and work with the true insider to efficiently enforce the tax laws as to the large wealthy taxpayer.